


Bluebells cockle shells eevy ivy over

by Demon_Cookie101



Series: Prompted AU Oneshots [4]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Humanstuck, M/M, Soulmate AU, anxiety mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-09
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-05-25 16:23:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6202459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Demon_Cookie101/pseuds/Demon_Cookie101
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>PROMPT: Soulmate au where when you write something on your skin with pen/marker/whatever the hell you want, it will show up on your soul mates skin as well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. - Eridan.

**Author's Note:**

> So a friend of my sent me the tumblr link with this particular Au in it, and this is what I came up with.  
> Also the fic has practically nothing to do with the title, I just like it.  
> I can't really imagine Eridan or Sollux skipping to children's rhymes.
> 
> THERE IS NOW ART FOR THIS. MADE BY THE GLORIOUS REDVAPOREON ON TUMBLR (they're awesome, check their drawings)   
> http://redvaporeon-sk.tumblr.com/post/142708188331/red-vaporeon-guess-whos-back-at-it-with-fanart

It had started with fish. And then flowers. Then zentangles of many different kinds. Inside the fish, inside the flowers, inside circles and squares and whatever shape he could fit on his hands. His hands up to his elbows were almost constantly covered in ink. So much so that he went out to buy the kind of felt-tip pens that were safe to use on skin for prolonged periods of time. He remembered back in primary school, his teachers would always be cross with him when they saw the designs and swirls and doodles on his hands. It wasn’t until he started in his first year of high school that he started using it as an excuse. He couldn’t keep his hands still. It helped him remember.

It helped calm the social anxiety that sent him spiralling into dizzy spells and feeling claustrophobic.

His favourite pen was a simple black one, and a violet one that went so well with the black one. Sometimes he would write little notes on his arms to remind himself of homework or what time his shift at the local bookshop started, but most of the time he used images as reminders.

It wasn’t until he was in his first year of university did words start appearing on his hands that weren’t from him.

And they always came through when he was asleep, or just waking up.

Eridan had skipped his shift at the bookstore and his afternoon visual arts class when he woke up that first morning and saw the words scrawled over the back of his hand.  
‘ _I like the flowers. Are you going to draw them again?’_

He didn’t have the guts to reply until after several cups of tea and breakfast.  
‘ _I don’t know. They’re a bit old, don’t you think? Overdone, all that stuff.’  
‘I don’t think so. I liked the spirally one you did when I was twelve. About eight years ago.’_

Well, at least his soulmate was the same age as him. Eridan studied the writing that had curled over to his palm now, studying the way that the ‘s’ seem to swirl and loop back to join with the rest of the letters. The writing wasn’t neat, nothing like his, but Eridan liked it. It seemed to suit whoever was writing back to him.

So he started drawing flowers again. Not all the time, but most days he would draw different types of flowers along his wrist, or his fingers, or once he drew a stream of bluebells from his wrist to the crook of his elbow.

In return he got snippets of jokes, or motivational sayings, or one time a funky little Link who brandished a sword at him. It wasn’t drawn well, but it made his day. So he drew a Zelda in return, taking the sword from Link and giving him a pen instead. The little comic strip stayed on his hand for nearly three days.

It was nice to know that he had a soulmate. That he had someone on the other side of his drawings.

And Sollux, as he learned his name was, became even more helpful when he found himself trying to drag himself out of a despairing hole of self-hatred and bitter loathing whenever something didn’t turn out right. Eridan didn’t like to think about it, how he’d drawn just lines. Lines and lines and lines, horizontal, vertical, diagonal, up and down his arms as though he was trying to gouge the hatred out of himself, capture it in the inked nets.

Link appeared on his hand again, holding a pen. Eridan remembered just crying, curling up with his hands in his lap in the middle of his studio. It wasn’t easy, to get back up and pick up the pencil and put it to the paper again. But Sollux was there with his badly-drawn link and his dumb jokes and stupid puns.

And now, standing nervously at a bus stop and with fiddling with the pen in his pocket, Eridan needed Link again. His arms was already littered with nine-square noughts and crosses games, and hangman (he’s convinced that using Shakespeare words are not allowed in hangman, Sollux really needs to stop with all the long words.) to try and calm his growing panic, his anxiety. There were a heap of people waiting at the bus stop, and Eridan had been here for over an hour already, shoulders hunched and scarf drawn up over his chin as he watched each bus come and go. He didn’t own a car, because he walked to most places in town, or took his motorbike if it was outside of walking distance. The bus stop was at the edge of town, and his townhouse wasn’t too far of a walk, so he wasn’t worried about hiring a car or getting a taxi once the bus had arrived.

But he was still worried, still feeling caged in amongst all these people waiting for the bus from the airport to arrive and drop off their loved ones or friends or whoever they were waiting for.

Because Eridan was waiting for Sollux, and he did not like crowds at all.

To distract himself, he turned his left hand this way and that, trying to find a clean patch of skin. Sollux had told him to keep the skin on the back of his hand free, and didn’t say why. That had been last night already, so he didn’t touch that bit. Eventually, he just rolled his sleeve up more, past his elbow and started drawing a bundle of wildflowers in the crook of his arm. He noticed writing curling itself underneath one of the noughts and crosses games on his right arm. Eridan’s own writing on that hand was wonky, shaky. He’s not too good with his left hand, but apparently Sollux is ambidextrous, because his writing is the same scrawl on both arms. The writing that appeared now was a simple, ‘ _I think we’re less than ten minutes away. I just saw the sign for your town. I like the wildflowers.’_ There was no Link, but it was enough for Eridan, who added a little smiley face next to his wildflowers and continued drawing them.

He was so intent on his wildflowers now, happily lost in the lines and swoops and petals and leaves that he only noticed the words on the back of his left hand when he turned his arm to continue onto his elbow. Eridan stopped drawing, raising his hand to read the words.

‘ _Found you.’_

He raised his head, hope and happiness and nervousness blooming in his chest. His eyes found blue and brown, and the pen dropped from his hand as he stepped forward into the outstretched arms, into the hug he had been waiting for for over an hour.

“Found you,” he whispered back.


	2. - Sollux

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who commented/kudos!!

It took you just under three weeks to learn how to draw Link properly.

After you visited Eridan at his little town by the coast, he’s been drawing more and more things on your arms. His arms. Whichever arms. It varies now. He still draws your favourite flower, little frangipanis, and he still likes to draw vines and random landscapes. One time you woke up and saw eyes on the back of your hand. It was weird, but after a bit they ended up being coloured in, and you saw your own eyes looking back at you. You told Eridan it was creepy and pretty at the same time, and asked why he drew them

‘ _So I can remember them. Photos don’t do it justice Sol’_. Sol. He always calls you Sol now. You don’t really know why, or complain much because that would just make you a hypocrite when you call him ED. His smile was adorable when he heard you say it for the first time, when you both were walking away from the bus stop and towards his house.  You had written it before, obviously, scrawling it across the back of your hand once when you were in a hurry and just wanted to reply to his question about whether he should just stick with a bleached bit of hair or dye it a pretty violet. You had simply said, ‘ _ED I don’t care much for your hair, I already know it will look good on you no matter what’._ You didn’t get a reply for nearly two hours after that. And you still don’t really know why, it was a compliment after all.

But as you’ve found out, Eridan isn’t too good at taking compliments. He always gets this weird smile on his face, as though he thinks you’re joking and that he’s just waiting for the other shoe to drop. It’s almost… heartbreaking. Or, it is to you at least. He’s the sort of person who deserves compliments. His artworks are amazing, his face is prettier than any thing you’ve seen, and he can cook better than your mum. And your mum is a really, really good cook. Five star-restaurant chef level good.

You’re pretty sure you got the good end of the soulmate deal here, but sometimes you wonder if Eridan is disappointed in you. You can only cook mac and cheese, toasties and the occasional stir fry. You spend nearly all hours of the week holed up in your room when you’re not at classes or getting groceries, and you’re a computer junkie. You mess around with hardware and software and lines upon lines of code to see how they work, what makes them tick, how you can dismantle them and fix them so that they’re better.

And you can’t draw.

You’re not too sure why that always sticks in your mind as a defining point. A solid thing that might make Eridan wish he had someone else, but you just can’t draw. Stick figures and the wonkiest Link ever are the extent of your skills. You never really saw the need to put effort into practicing and bettering yourself, coding always seemed more fun, but then you had bluebells and frangipanis crawling up your arm that looked so real you though that someone had dropped flowers on you. He can draw so well, even though some things he does or works with aren’t as good as others. Say digital is not as good as traditional for example, or cats as opposed to dogs, or baby faces as opposed to young adult ones. He draws so well, and you can’t draw at all and you feel like a bit of a letdown because it seems like it’s something that he needs, that he finds comfort in.

Not to mention that time, that horrible horrible time where black lines just filled up your arms like fishnets, covering the beautiful seahorse he’d done on your wrist and the tangle vines on your elbow, where you just didn’t know what to do. There wasn’t any space to write anything in a hurry, and you didn’t know what to say. What can you say to something like that? Nothing anyone had ever said to you when you felt like you were drowning on air and everyone was just watching you seemed to fit with him. Nothing was coming to you and you were panicking in the middle of a supermarket. Until in front of you, when you looked up to see if you should call for help, you saw some kid with a legend of Zelda shirt, and you just drew Link. On your right hand, which wasn’t as covered as your left. You drew Link as best as you could and waited.

Eridan finally got back to you an hour later.  An hour of writing down every shitty joke and pun you knew, that your brother had told you, that your father had said, that Terezi had told you in school. An hour of writing them in the gaps made by the black lines. He only wrote ‘ _thank you’_ , but you were just glad that he wrote back at all.

But since you returned home after your ten-day stay with him, you’ve been practicing. A lot. Just Link though, you don’t really have much time for anything else. When you’re waiting for the latest codes you’ve written to come into effect, you doodle Link. When you’re waiting on the bus, you draw him. When you’re at breakfast or whenever time you’re eating, you draw him. You’re trying really hard, just so that next time (oh you hope there’s no next time), you can offer him something better. You hate that you live so far away, but you don’t have enough money to do a full move to him, and Eridan’s terrified of flying and doesn’t own a car to make the drive. You’ve always wanted to move out of the tiny town you’re living in, because while Eridan’s town is just as small, his is closer to a city and it’s got Eridan. You hate that you can’t be there for him when he needs the physical support. You hate that you can only be there in word and in a badly drawn Link. You want to be there more than you are now, but that requires money. And you’re already working as hard as you can to save up enough. Eridan’s offered to pay for your flight, but you’re not sure if you want to take him up on it. It’s logical, but you’ve never been good at taking money from people, especially when you need it.

He’s drawing on you right now, decorating your left arm with some small petalled hanging flower. Eridan always ends up writing the name of the flower or plant he’s drawn, and this time is no different. The word ‘ _wisteria’_ curls itself around your wrist, and you have to smile. You had assumed that he would have a garden full of flowers and plants and everything when you had gone over, based on how many flowers he draws, but he doesn’t. Or not yet anyway. His garden is big enough, but it’s empty. Boring. He wants to give it life, but he says he’s waiting for the next spring to start. Which is logical enough, you suppose.

Maybe by then you’ll be there to help him with it, help him colour coordinate because he doesn’t like certain colours next to each other and you hate it when colours aren’t really in order. But when you pick up the pen sitting next to your mouse and start drawing on your right arm, carefully, slowly, starting with Link’s dumb hat and going from there, you decide that having a garden full of flowers and vegies and fruit trees that are colour-coordinated to yours and Eridan’s taste is not a bad way to live.

**Author's Note:**

> link for tumblr post: http://catsandanimenerd.tumblr.com/post/140711297501/frozenmusings-diminuendodaydreams


End file.
